How to choose a recruitment PR agency: the questions to ask first

Thinking of hiring a PR agency? Ask these questions first.

Over the past few months, I've spoken to agency leaders who have noticed something strange. Their website traffic is down, and their SEO agency is telling them one thing, while their marketing team is hearing something else. Meanwhile, everyone seems to be talking about AEO, GEO, AI visibility and generative search.

The reality is that search is changing. People aren't just Googling any more, they're asking ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and other AI tools for recommendations, advice and supplier suggestions. And those tools don't just pull information from your website, they collate content and resources from across the web, and prioritise that over your own content. Which means being talked about by trusted third parties has never been more important. In other words, PR has suddenly become a much bigger conversation.

The challenge is that many recruitment agencies have never worked with a PR agency before. They know visibility matters, they know they need to build authority, and they know AI search is changing the rules.

But they have absolutely no idea what they're supposed to look for in a PR partner. After our recent webinar, Who do the robots recommend? The age of AI search, one of the most common questions I received was essentially: “How do I know if a PR agency is any good?”

So, whether you work with BlueSky PR or somebody else entirely, here are the questions I'd be asking.

1. Do they understand recruitment?

They should, and it should show from the first conversation. Recruitment is its own ecosystem, so a good recruitment PR agency already understands your market rather than learning it on your budget.

This sounds obvious, but it's amazing how often it's overlooked. The media landscape is different to more generalist business services sectors. The trends move quickly, the terminology is unique and the stories that interest recruiters won't always interest journalists, and vice versa.

A good recruitment PR agency should already understand:

• Recruitment itself and what makes it ‘tick’
• The sectors you recruit into and their own nuances
• The publications that matter
• The challenges recruitment businesses face
• The difference between content that drives engagement and content that drives coverage
• What does success look like?
• How is it reported?
• How does PR support wider business goals?
• How does coverage contribute to visibility, authority and lead generation?
• Will they buy backlinks?
• Will they produce huge quantities of AI-generated content?
• Will they guarantee coverage?
• Will they prioritise volume over quality?

Yes, a new PR agency needs to get to know the ins and outs of your brand, but you shouldn't have to spend six months educating your PR agency about your market.

2. Can they explain how PR supports AI search?

A good agency can explain it clearly. Visibility in AI answers comes from expertise, credibility and third-party validation, not from publishing more AI-generated content, and earning that is exactly what PR does.

This is becoming a significant differentiator when choosing the best PR agency (and for recruitment businesses themselves). And during our webinar it was one of the key points we discussed.

Ask any prospective agency: “How does your PR strategy help us become more visible in AI search?” If they can't answer that question, I'd be concerned.

Don't get me wrong, you don't need them to be technical GEO experts, but they should understand why media coverage, expert commentary, citations, thought leadership and trusted third-party mentions matter more than ever.

3. What media relationships do they have?

Real ones, and they should be able to prove it. Look for evidence of regular, named coverage and journalists coming to them for comment, not just a media database subscription.

Every PR agency claims to have media contacts, but ask them to go deeper. What publications do they regularly place clients in? Where's the evidence to prove that? How often do journalists come directly to them for commentary? What stories have they successfully landed recently?

Don't go asking for a full list of contacts, though; no agency will give away their intellectual property like that. But a good PR agency should be able to demonstrate genuine relationships, not just a media database subscription.

4. How do they create news from businesses that aren't naturally newsworthy?

By finding the story others miss. The skill of PR is spotting angles in everyday business activity, so you don't have to wait for an acquisition or a research project to have something to say.

Most recruitment agencies don't announce acquisitions every week and they don't conduct huge research projects every month, and that's fine. The real skill of PR isn't distributing obvious news, it's identifying opportunities where nobody else sees them.

Ask the agency, “What stories would you create for a business like ours?” The quality of that answer will tell you a lot.

5. How will they use your consultants and leadership team?

Constantly, if they're any good. Your consultants see market shifts before the research does, so a strong agency turns that day-to-day insight into comment, articles and media opportunities.

This is probably the most overlooked question. Your consultants are often your biggest competitive advantage. They speak to candidates and clients every day and they understand market shifts before they appear in research reports. They know which skills are in demand, what salaries are doing, where hiring is slowing and where it's accelerating.

A good PR agency should be finding ways to turn that expertise into comments, articles, insights and media opportunities. If they're only talking about your company and not your people, they're missing a huge opportunity.

6. How will they measure success?

With more than AVE (for those of you who remember that metric anyway). Expect clear reporting against your business goals, and a view of how coverage builds visibility, authority and leads.

Ask them:

The best agencies understand that coverage is only part of the story. What matters is what you're collectively doing with the content, whether you're becoming more trusted, more visible and easier to find.

7. What won't they do?

This is one of my favourite questions. Any agency can tell you what they'll do, but ask them what they won't do that other agencies may offer.

The answers often reveal more than the sales pitch.

Choosing an agency when you've never invested in PR

PR isn't becoming less important because of AI, it's becoming more important. And if you're looking for a PR agency for the first time, ask the difficult questions. Any good agency should welcome them because it demonstrates that you're looking for a partner and it sets the tone for future relationships.

For me, some of the longest standing clients I've worked with started with an honest discussion or debate around PR, its value and what we really think will work. And we have no problem pushing back if we don't think PR is the best solution for business objectives.

Want to ask the BlueSky PR team a difficult question about PR? Get in touch today.

Author: Vickie Collinge

Vickie Collinge has been part of BlueSky PR since 2011 and brings more than fifteen years in recruitment marketing and PR. A regular speaker at industry events with a sharp eye for a story, she builds media and content strategies for her clients.  

Frequently asked questions

What questions should you ask before hiring a recruitment PR agency?

Ask whether they understand recruitment, how their PR supports AI search, what media relationships they genuinely hold, how they create news from everyday business activity, how they will use your consultants and leaders, how they measure success beyond AVE, and what they won't do.

Do you need a PR agency that specialises in recruitment?

It helps enormously. A specialist already understands the sector's media, terminology and challenges, so you spend less time and budget bringing them up to speed and see results sooner.

How does PR improve visibility in AI search (AEO and GEO)?

AI tools prioritise trusted third-party content over your own website, so media coverage, expert commentary, citations and thought leadership make you more likely to be recommended. You don't earn that visibility by publishing more AI-generated content.

Is AVE a useful way to measure PR?

Not on its own. Better measures are the quality of coverage, how it is reported against business goals, and how it contributes to visibility, authority and lead generation.